Businessweek: GM Must Fashion Another Cadillac Renaissance

[goblue]

Originally Posted by Hoboken Tim

GM never seems to learn from their mistakes. You can not make a world class
luxury car on the bones of a mass market car. The new SRX is a dolled up Vue and the coming DTS will be a dolled up LaCrosse. Big Mistake! Both of these cars should have been based on the CTS.

Exactly.

Originally Posted by megeebee

And what vehicle, in your opinion, leads the SRX's Class?

Does any luxury maker, or any automaker of any kind anywhere on Earth, produce aline of vehicles that are acknowledged to be the head of each class the compete in?

How do you mean "class leading"?

Is every Lexus or Mercedes the best in its respective class? What about those areas where these two compete? In the LS class leading or the S? The IS or the C Class? What about the BMW 3 Series? Is that better or worse than the Lexus or the Mercedes? If not, then why doesn't BMW take heat for it?

For starters, you don't put a base engine in it that is below average for acceleration and very average for fuel economy when you have alternatives in the parts bin. Next, if you are going to do a turbo - then you do it better than what's in a VW Beetle or at least equal to what's in a Taurus.

We can go on. It's a great car, but some competitors are better in more areas than the SRX is.

[kryptonics]

Originally Posted by megeebee

Northstar debacle??? I don't remember that. I had 2 or three Northstar engines and they all performed trouble free.

I've heard very few complaints about the Northstar over the years. Mine just hit 10 years and the only problem is the standard slow oil leak/burn. I'm going to research this more...

[LS4]

Originally Posted by Hoboken Tim

GM never seems to learn from their mistakes. You can not make a world class
luxury car on the bones of a mass market car. The new SRX is a dolled up Vue and the coming DTS will be a dolled up LaCrosse. Big Mistake! Both of these cars should have been based on the CTS.

Mgescuro, is that you?

[2002 Caddy]

Originally Posted by megeebee

Northstar debacle??? I don't remember that. I had 2 or three Northstar engines and they all performed trouble free.

Google NorthStar and Headgaskets... The pain, the horror, the frustration, the lost opportunities. All NorthStars built before 2000 are ticking time bombs just waiting to overheat and have their owners go Kaboom when they get the $4000 repair bill from the dealer.

"Debacle" is the perfect word.

[ryannel2003]

Some Northstar's suffer from headgasket problems that stem from a problem with the headbolts pulling from the block. The only solution is to take the motor out of the car and use timeserts to fix the block. If you just fix the gasket you'll be pulling the motor again in no time. The reason why it's so expensive is because there is no room to work on the motor inside the car and it requires you pull the motor, which is a labor intensive process. It's a $3-4k dollar job and most dealers go ahead and replace mounts, oil seals, etc. If you get the motor done it should outlast the body.

Had my 2000 STS done at 54k miles and it's still holding strong at 78k. If GM had spent a little bit more money into build quality these cars would hold up alot better than they do. Same with the motor.

[WishIhadatruck]

Originally Posted by tgagneguam

...GM management's shortsightedness just makes me cringe. So, a division is producing a rather impressive $2.5 billion from relatively few vehicle sales so the solution is... to starve it of new product. I'm hoping that someone, somewhere in the Company has been taking notes.

No kidding. When I read that it made me cringe as well. Cadillac was just getting momentum when they just seemed to stall a few years ago.

[K-1]

CTS - pretty good, but needs more tech to lead the brand.
Escalade - meh, overpriced Tahoe, drives like a truck.
SRX - nice fielding, but comes up short
FWD XTS - fail

They certainly need to up the ante.

[fastball]

Northstar in and of itself was not a problem - they were reliable engines (unless you needed a new starter which was located in the engine block by some dumbass engineering). The reason why Northstar equipped Caddys were slow sellers is the HT4100 debacle had caught up by 1993 and ruined Cadillac's reputation for the next 10-15 years.

Cadillacs of the 1990s could have been designed by Ferrari, engineered by Rolls Royce, and have more technological innovations than NASA all the while priced no more than $20k and they STILL would have been slow sellers.

The 1980's Cadillacs KILLED the reputation, and to this day they are still carying that stigma. Fair or not, it is the truth.

Somewhere some former GM engineer or CEO is having nightly nightmares about that motor.

[PAULSTS1]

After the XTS (or whatever the project gets named) is out and buyers see the new body and upgraded features, Cadillacs will sell again! I unlike many here don't see BMW or Mercedes as a problem to Cadillac sales, they never were, it was the lackadaisical way Cadillac was marketed as an upscale Buick, or Chevrolet. Cadillac lost sales because of other GM brands, today this won't happen again--NO Pontiac, different Chevrolet.

What is now required is product to sell, and the ability to offer what a Cadillac buyer wants: Full sized luxury, mid-sized luxury, a convertible, a Coupe, a CUV, and a SUV. Once Cadillac is a full line up again, the dealers will move cars.

[FanOfDurant]

GM never seems to learn from their mistakes. You can not make a world class
luxury car on the bones of a mass market car. The new SRX is a dolled up Vue and the coming DTS will be a dolled up LaCrosse. Big Mistake! Both of these cars should have been based on the CTS.

THIS.

and this...

CTS - pretty good, but needs more tech to lead the brand.
Escalade - meh, overpriced Tahoe, drives like a truck.
SRX - nice fielding, but comes up short
FWD XTS - fail

They certainly need to up the ante.

Quotes of truth. The Escalade IS an overpriced Tahoe Period. Another dilema they 'could' have worked their way around if there wasn't that other rebadged Tahoe called a GMC Yukon Denali. The SRX I kinda like but Again, you have GMC and this time Buick competing for the same market. Why not just buy the Chevrolet equivalent when the quality is there? Chevrolet is GM's bread and butter, the quality HAS to bet there from here on out or they can call it a day. The XTS, FWD? How about RWD, AWD or nothing. This is Cadillac! I like the CTS... They better stick some $$ into that to keep it out front because without it, what does Cadillac really have that's so special?

[Buick61]

I feel like we can't have a "how to fix Cadillac" thread until mgescuro gets back from Europe.

[BlekherBob]

It really pisses me off when they badmouth Fleetwoods and DeVilles. There is a reason they seemed like a good idea when they came out...

[Dr. Show-Me]

I think the best solution to bad Cadillac engines is a 150,000 mile powertrain warranty.
After GM replaces 10% of the engines each year, they would upgrade the engines to bulletproof.
So you end up with Back it better > forced to build it better or build it better > back it better. Either way, the customer wins.

[Dr. Show-Me]

"I feel like we can't have a "how to fix Cadillac" thread until mgescuro gets back from Europe."
Did he go to Germany for conjugal visits with his German hearthrobs?

[2002 Caddy]

Originally Posted by fastball

Northstar in and of itself was not a problem - they were reliable engines (unless you needed a new starter which was located in the engine block by some dumbass engineering). The reason why Northstar equipped Caddys were slow sellers is the HT4100 debacle had caught up by 1993 and ruined Cadillac's reputation for the next 10-15 years.

Cadillacs of the 1990s could have been designed by Ferrari, engineered by Rolls Royce, and have more technological innovations than NASA all the while priced no more than $20k and they STILL would have been slow sellers.

The 1980's Cadillacs KILLED the reputation, and to this day they are still carying that stigma. Fair or not, it is the truth.

Somewhere some former GM engineer or CEO is having nightly nightmares about that motor.

Much wrong with post... MUST fix...

OK... first off the early NorthStars were HUGE sellers in 1993 they were flying off of the shelves and Cadillac was selling everyone they could make... HUGE sellers... The Eldos, STS/SLS/Sevilles and the Devilles/DTS were monster sellers... In fact sales of these cars were uber strong from their introduction in 1992 (and later for the Deville) until about 2000... That time at Cadillac makes the current Renaissance look like a feild trip to the morgue.

Of course around 2000 the sales started to peter out... as is the trend with a nearly 10 year old car...

The NorthStar was flawed and a reliability DISASTER from day one too.... I know of one engine machinist who put his kids through college on the money he made on ONLY this motor... On more then one Caddy forum there is a poll not about IF your NorthStar head gasket leaks but which years leak the most (that's when we all figured out that the 1996/97/98/99 are the really bad ones... ) And the dirty little secret about 2000 and 2004 head bolt changes... Oh, The failure rate of NorthStar headgaskets are about 10,000:1 compared to LSx failures..

And we haven't even touched on the debacle that are fuel pressure regulators, crank sensors, water pumps, oil leaks, oil use, water pump covers. Actually the starter tucked up in the valley of the engine was not all that bad of idea and NorthStar Starters have proven to be MORE reliable then LS starters which hang down by the head pipes (*Cough* SS Camaro recall *cough*)

PS Cadillacs of the 90's were designed by pininfarina... the same company that designs bodies for Ferrari.